Falling Into You (28 page)

“I give up.”
H
e picks me up and carries me to the bed and my legs are wrapped around his chest and we’re drowning in each other.

He lays me on the bed and looks at me for
a long moment
. I try to sit up, to grab at him, but he’s
gazing at my body and although I’ve forgotten to be embarrassed, I’m suddenly very aware that I am totally naked and that all my flaws, the scars on my lower abdomen and on my leg, are visible.

He kisses each one. “This one?” he asks.

“Appendix.” It’s true.

“It’s a sexy scar,” he says, lingering over it. “And this one?”
He’s touching the half-moon shape on my calf, which has faded over the years to nothing more than a stretching of skin. I shudder involuntarily, but he doesn’t notice it, or the face that my voice is strangled.

“I don’t rem
ember.” It’s true and not true. H
e doesn’t question.
I’m holding my breath and there are flashes of another pair of hands on my body, other eyes on mine, and I’m shaking a little and pulling myself back from him and trying to breathe evenly.

An old, sad story, I remind myself, trying to pull myself back into the moment. I run my fingers through his arm, trying to concentrate on him. This is what you want, Hallie. This is what you want.

He’s kissing my leg, all the way inside my thigh.

“Stop,” I moan
.
I don’t mean it. I want him to keep kissing me, to make me forget.
He mistakes my
intention and starts to pull away.

“You’ve come to your senses. Finally.”

I haven’
t.
I take the opportunity to push him down
beneath me.
I’m straddling him
and kissing his chest, the little hollow in his neck.

H
e groans and flips me back onto the bed. “Cheater.”

“I’m willing to take any advantage I can get.”

We’re both laughing
one minute
and then we’
re not. His fingers move under the curve of my breasts, over my belly and lower. He
slips a finger inside me
and the sensation shoots through me as he moves them back and forth, watching my face.

I try not to think about the expertise in those fingers, and the fact that he’s been here with other girls.
Probably a lot of other girls.
He sees the concern in my face and he kisses me then, pulling his fingers away and I moan a little bit for the loss, but he’s trying to say something.

“You are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

I kiss him and p
ull back. “I want you
right now.” I do. I need our flesh to be joined
and the consequences be damned
.

There’s something else in his face and he opens his mouth again to say something and in
a second, I know what it is.
His eyes are huge and filled with emotion,
and it’s
for me. He can’t say it. I can’t let him.
It would ruin everything, because
it can’t be the truth.

“
Hallie
, I think I…”

“
Be careful
, Chris
.”

T
here’s disappointment
there,
in his eyes.
I see it and
I’m
trying to drive
the thought away by pulling him on top of me.

“I need you,
”
I tell him.

“I need you, too.” But t
hose words aren’
t safe either. N
othing about this is safe.

He’s toying with my breasts, kissing one and then the other and I’m reaching for him, trying to tell him with my body that I need this, that I want him right now. He groans and tries to tear himself from me, but I wrap my legs more tightly around him and he’s pressing into my thigh and I’m on the brink of exploding just from being close to him.

He reaches into the drawer by the side
of the bed and grabs a wrapper.
I take it from him and wrap my hands around his length, sliding
it
on.

“Are you sure?” he asks me, staring deep into me.

“I’ve never been so sure of anything,” I say, and he leans over and kisses me
one more time.
We’re kissing each other
endlessly and he slides a little bit into me and we moan together and breathe together and
feel together
.

“Jesus Christ,” he says, running his fingers through my hair. “You are so beautiful. I…” His words trail off and he’s smiling down at me. “
Hallie
.”

The sound of my name on his lips overwhelms me. His voice is raw and needy and there’s nothing I wouldn’t give to him.
He moves, slowly, and I
raise my hips to meet him, and he lets out a low groan as our bodies are tangled together
.

I remember the dancing on the rooftop and our bodies are joined now, and
it’s a different kind of dance. W
e fit together perfectly. W
e’re moving, f
aster, faster, towards oblivion. M
y body is starting to rebel against me and I feel like I’m going to drown.

It’s like I was made for him.

“
Hallie
, I can’t…”

His face is contorted and
I feel like everything inside me is breaking and then being made whole again.
I am wanted, needed even. I know I can never recover from this. From him.

“Oh, god. Hallie.” The sound of him saying my name, filled with desire and need and want makes me forget everything else but this moment and he’s crying out and I’m moving faster against him.

My muscles unravel, and I’m crying out and he’s joining me.
Moments later, he
slumps on top of me, kissing m
y face and hair and neck
.
We stay like that for a lo
ng time, until he rolls off
and nestles me into the crook of his arm
.
I’m curled into him and I am safe and warm
and I’m wishing that people could actually live exactly like this
.

We’re silent for long minutes, but I can feel his eyes boring into me so I smile softly. “Sorry for seducing yo
u,” I say
.

He chuckles, and it’s a low, intimate sound. “Not as sorry as I am that I didn’t do
that the first time I saw you.”

“On the patio?”

“On the patio, in the diner, in the museum, in the park, in the middle of the party, everywhere. We’re never going to be able to leave this bed. I will never let you leave this bed. I didn’t
know it could be like this. I never…” He doesn’t finish the sentence, just looks up at me instead with wide eyes.

I kiss his soft, pliable lips and bury my face in his chest, willing him not to say another word. I want to stay
in this moment, to live and breathe and feel it
, to take a picture in my mind so that I can look back a thousand times, a million times.
Because I know that fairy tales aren’t a forever kind of deal. You just hang on as long as you can.

Chapter 18

CHRIS

I reach for her,
like I did countless
time
s
during the night and morning
and the next afternoon
, but she’s gone.
I’m empty
.
I reach
for
the pillow and there’s a piece of paper
l
ying on top of it
.

Didn’t want to wake you, although you didn’t seem to have any compunction about doing that
about eighteen times last night.
I went to grab some coffee. If you’re lucky, maybe I’ll bring you some. Your phone has been ringing all
day, because apparently, we managed to stay in bed for almost 24 hours.
By the way, I think I’m definitely going to keep
Sophia
’s red dress. It seems to have worked wonders.

I only woke her up
three
times, I think defensively, and then a smile crosses my face as I think about her
responses. And she woke me up once, too. I smile at the memory of
her tongue
sliding
over my body.

Hallie
, the perfect innocent schoolgirl.
Involuntarily,
Sophia
’s words from the night before enter my brain.

Not quite. I grin to myself at the thought of it, but then my stomach twists
at the thought of another guy with his hands all over her,
his body
in her skin.

I was just going to have to make sure that never happened again.

My muscles ached and hearing voices in the living room, I grab
my phone. 6:24
pm. Jesus. Marcus was going to kill me.
Peals of laughter hit my ears. 
I had to get to Hallie
. I was going to have to think about
Marcus
later.

I was still pulling my shirt over my head as I made my way into the kitchen.
Hallie
’s
sitting on a stool, in a pair of jeans and one of my t-shirts, laughing casually with
my sister. She looks
up at me, and overcome with a rush of emotion, I grab her face and cover her swollen lips with mine.

She whispers into my ear. “Your sister is watching us.”

“I don’t care,” I whisper back. I turn to Diana. “Good morning.”

Her eyes are twinkling. “Little brother.
Good to know you’re still alive.” She smiles at me wickedly. “One way or the other.
 
By the way, Marcus
has called
, oh, I don’t kn
ow, at least ten thousand times. I finally had to tell him that your lazy ass was still in bed, and I don’t think you want to hear what he said about that.”

I groan. “You should have told him that I was dead.”

“Now, where’s the fun in that?” She holds up a picture of a three-year-old me banging on a pair of drums. “
Hallie
and I were perusing old family albums.
We even managed to get to a couple of the videos
.”

Hallie
’s grinning at me deviously. “I think my favorite is the one where you’re opening the Christmas presents in the middle of the night and then you try to pass it off like you’re Santa’s little elf. Creative. Very creative.”

“Diana, I am going to kill you.”

“Not if Marcus gets there first.”

“Fine. Fine.” I wrap my arms around
Hallie
again. “Can you manage my very evil sister’s company for another
minute or two while I make a phone call
?”

“I think I can manage your very wonderful sister’s company,”
Hallie
says, shaking her finger at me as I start walking back to my room.

They’re
giggling again. A
s I
glance
back, Diana’s looking after me with a wicked smile. “Did I tell you yet about…”

I grab my phone and dial Marcus’s number
, trying to get this over with before they start digging into the really embarrassing stuff
.

When Marcus picks up the phone, he’s speaking to someone in his most cajoling tone.
“No, sweetheart, it’s just going to be a minute.
We’ve already landed. A
ren’t you supposed to be able to use your phone after you land? No, I didn’t hear about that.
You know those FCC people are full of shit, anyways. Calm down, calm down. You know, you have a face made for television. Have you ever thought about being an actress?”

It’s another moment before he gets back to me. “Shit, mother fucking shit, Jensen. I bought us a couple of minutes, because this is extremely important. I’m going to have to install a GPS tracker in you
r brain
. Alan wants to do dinner at Delmonico at 9
to talk about logistics. Do you think you can manage to make yourself available for the fucking director of your next film?”

I don’t say anything for a minute.

“Chris? Fuck. Jensen?”

“Delmonico at 9.” There’s no way I’m getting out of this one. “
Fine. I’m bringing a date.”

“Bring whoever you want, as long as you can fucking show up. We’re still ironing out the details, but everything should be locked up by the end of the week. They want to do the announcement on Thursday. Got that? Papers signed Wednesday, and then we’re introducing the new James Ross to the world.”